A Still Small Voice

I don't know you but I feel for you. The thing that causes the most pain is the most recurrent thought, in my experience. While I too would advise the same as the others (get your mind off the situation etc. etc.), I know how hard that would be.

I don't think your current problem is a crisis of faith - I think it is probably just manifesting as one. You said yourself that you've lost friends, family, stability. The only thing you have left is a shred of comfort that is being provided by religion and you are now denying yourself that comfort. Not to sound Oprah-esque about it but it does sound like you're beating yourself up as hard as you possibly can from every angle imaginable.

You mentioned being in therapy. This is something you should bring up in your next session. While your crisis of faith does need addressing eventually, I think your desire to deny yourself comfort requires addressing now.

Best of luck.

BadBadBad

If there's one thing in life we must cling to and never question, why shouldn't that be the simple reality that we open our eyes and see? Why should it be fantasy and imagination and that which makes us happy, that which we want to be true? I open my eyes. I'm alive. Then I see death. I don't see fanciful life after death. I just see a rotting carcass. That's what I mean. If we must cling to something in life, and never question it, why shouldn't it be the simple reality we see when we open our eyes?

Heathen Dawn

If there’s one thing that’s preached on this board, it is never to take things on people’s mere say-so. This I do: people say “this is fantasy” and “that is imagination”, but I know better than to digest those words blindly. I declare something to be fantasy only when the world doesn’t work that way—for example, an omni-max God in a world of birth defects. In contrast, there is nothing about life after death that contradicts what we know about the world.

And you’ve chosen to ignore my post entirely. You talk about “the simple reality we see when we open our eyes”, but the very fact that we have to use our eyes to see it means that it’s a perception, not the actual, objective reality. The cardinal faith of naturalism is that the senses and instruments we use are the key to the whole of reality. You’re entitled to that faith, but it is a faith. Sagan’s “the cosmos is all there is, was or ever will be” is a statement of faith, not a scientific discovery. And since naturalism too involves the use of faith, the trusting leap into the dark abyss, I see no superiority in it, and I feel no obligation to think according to it, and I feel fully justified in choosing a different way. I am not moved by your attempts to shame theists into disbelieving by portraying this as a war between inferior faith and superior reason. I don’t buy that. Guru Chopra and Guru Dawkins are equal in my mind as people I don’t take as authorities.

Heathen Dawn

I’ve got a sore throat and I have to go.

Baal, I just have this to say: as long as you’re good towards others, it doesn’t matter what you believe. You’ll find out your beliefs some day, I promise you that.

Buffman

Since you seem to question what is/isn't reality, then perhaps your sore throat is not real but merely a figment of your imagination...an imagination based on your faith rather than any reason. I fear I lack sufficient confidence in faith healing to recommend an appropriate course of action for you to rid your sensory body of this sore throat...or to support your allegation that "there is nothing about life after death that contradicts what we know about the world."

diana

Amen.

d